In case you've been in a coma for the past 24 hours, yesterday was the 2008 MacWorld Keynote Address by Apple CEO Steve Jobs. This is the big event when Apple unveils some of its new products to kick off the year, and the presentation for 2008 was a doozy. Here's a summary of the big announcements:
- Time Capsule: an Airport Extreme WiFi router + built-in 500GB or 1TB HD that syncs with Leopard's Time Machine for automatic wireless backups.
- iPhone: a bunch of new features including geo-locating Maps application, SMS to multiple contacts, WebClips (bookmark icons) and multiple customisable home screens.
- iPod Touch: new apps for the Touch include Mail, Maps, Weather, Stocks and Notes, in addition to WebClips and customisable home screens.
- iTunes Movie Rentals: rent DVD-quality movies for $2.99-$3.99 or HD movies for $1 more. Watch them on your Mac, iPod, iPhone or Widescreen TV using a revamped Apple TV that is no longer tied to a computer. Only in the US right away, and internationally by end of year.
- MacBook Air: "The world's thinnest notebook". Specs include: 3lbs, 13.3" widescreen, LED backlight display, built-in iSight, full-size backlit keyboard, multi-touch trackpad, 1.6 or 1.8GHz Core 2 Duo, 2GB of RAM, 80GB standard (iPod 1.8" HD) or 64GB SSD, and a battery life of 5hrs. There's no optical drive, but instead it has a new application called Remote Disk that allows the MacBook Air use another computer's optical drive over WiFi. All this and it's the most environmentally-friendly laptop ever built. I reeeally want one of these.
It's really hard not to be impressed. Seriously, this is hands-down the most slick and cleverly integrated family of hardware and software products on the market today. Nobody else is even close to touching Apple's offering of innovative computing solutions. Who cares about the enterprise market?!? From the home, to the studio, to the road, Apple has it figured out. I have a feeling they're going to make a LOT of money this year.
